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On this day in history in ....
1979 - Jimmy Snuka defeats Ricky Steamboat in the finals of a tournament to crown a new United States Champion in Charlotte, North Carolina. The title had been vacated when the previous champion, Ric Flair, won the NWA World Tag Team Title.
1985 - Former NWA World Tag Team Champion Jay Youngblood suffers a heart attack and passes away while on a tour of New Zealand. He was 30 years old.
1986 - Buzz Sawyer & Matt Borne defeats Chris Adams & Lance Von Erich in a tournament final in Fort Worth, Texas to become the first World Class Championship Wrestling World Tag Team Champions.
1987 - Yoshiaki Fujiwara & Kazuo Yamazaki defeats Akira Maeda & Nobuhiko Takada for the IWGP Tag Team Championship in Fukuoka, Japan.
1990 - One of the most memorable angles in Memphis wrestling took place during a live Saturday morning wrestling broadcast on WMC-TV in Memphis, Tennessee, as Eddie Gilbert attempted to run down Jerry Lawler with his brother Doug's car in the parking lot outside the studio. The car hit Lawler, who rolled over the hood and fell to the ground, suffering a bruised hip. Fans watching the show on television actually called the police to the WMC studios to report what had happened.
1990 - Dick Slater was awarded the USWA Heavyweight Title. The previous champion, John Tatum, was under contract to World Class Championship Wrestling when the USWA and World Class broke off working relations.
1990 - New Japan Pro Wrestling ran their first ever show in Halpin, China, drawing 4,000 fans. Here are the results:
- Kensuke Sasaki defeated Michiyoshi Ohara.
- Kantaro Hoshino defeated Black Cat.
- Masahiro Chono defeated Takayuki Iizuka.
- Jushin Liger defeated Osamu Matsuda.
- Riki Choshu defeated Hiro Saito.
- Antonio Inoki defeated Tatsutoshi Goto.
2005 - The final Thursday night edition of WWE Smackdown airs, ending a six-year run in the 8-10pm slot on UPN. The episode, headlined by Randy Orton vs. Rey Mysterio, earns a 3.0 rating.
The show moved to Friday nights the following week, and earned a 1.7 for a show headlined by World Champion Batista vs. JBL in a Bullrope match and Eddie Guerrero vs. Rey Mysterio in a steel cage match. However, that number is misleading. Due to a benefit concert for victims of Hurricane Katrina, the first episode of Friday Night Smackdown was shortened to an hour, with the other hour being posted on WWE.com. Several major markets, including New York and Boston, aired the one-hour version of Smackdown on Saturday due to baseball preemptions.
What is not misleading is that the show has only hit a 3.0 on rare occasions since moving to Friday, and has only surpassed it once, a 3.1 on November 18, 2005 for a tribute show to Eddie Guerrero headlined by Chavo Guerrero vs. JBL and Chris Benoit vs. Triple H. The show, which regularly surpassed 3.0 on Thursday's against the NBC powerhouse lineup, now struggles to stay in the low 2's on Fridays.
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